New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) has signed the RetrofitNY Pledge
RetrofitNY has made a Pledge. The purpose of this pledge is to mobilise the market to enable building owners to retrofit their buildings to net-zero energy (NZE) performance in a cost-effective way, significantly improving their building’s value and reducing its construction period and operating expenses, while improving residents’ quality of life. NYCHA, which has a total of 169,820 dwelling units in its portfolio, signed the RetrofitNY Pledge and has therefore committed to drastically reduce its GHG emissions by implementing deep energy and net zero retrofits. To date 15 additional social housing owners have signed on, totalling over 280,000 units aggregated under the RetrofitNY Pledge.
Climate Mobilization Act
As New York City has now passed the Climate Mobilization Act (CMA), in a few short years, the business landscape is going to be very different for building owners compared to what it is today, and owners need to be prepared for these changes now. The Climate Mobilization Act (CMA) includes legislation requiring owners of buildings over 25,000 square feet to substantially reduce their greenhouse gas emissions over time enabling the City to meet its targets of 40% by 2030 and 80% by 2050. The CMA would affect 50,000 buildings in the City. This law also requires the study of a citywide emissions trading scheme for carbon credits which, if enacted, may lead to an increase in value and revenue potential for NZE buildings whose performance would meet or exceed the mandated levels. Similar high-performance standards are pending or being implemented in Massachusetts, California, Vancouver and in many other municipalities.
The Pledge
New retrofit solutions must be made available in order to give building owners a viable way to comply with new laws, prepare for imminent changes in the market and reduce risk in their building portfolios, while enhancing the performance and value of their building assets. The RetrofitNY Pledge will allow building owners to use their collective buying power to compel manufacturers to introduce new retrofit solutions into the market at no risk to themselves. As proven by the success of similar programmes throughout Europe, Energiesprong for example, building owners’ signatures on this pledge will help to dramatically increase the availability of affordable high performance retrofit solutions from which they and the entire market will directly benefit.
Additional RetrofitNY programme information and resources are available at https://www.nyserda.ny.gov/RetrofitNY.